Testimony Prepared for United States Secretar of Labor Robert B. Reich
Committee on Foreign Relations United States Senate [09/20/94]

Mr. Chairman and Members of the Committee:

Thank you for the opportunity to testify before you on the important matter
of the ratification of ILO Convention 150 concerning labor administration. As
you know, it obligates us to organize, coordinate and effectively operate our
labor law and labor policy administration activities. Consultation, cooperation
and negotiation with employer and worker representatives are key elements in the
effective operation of a labor administration system. It is the view of this
Administration that the United States is in full compliance with the terms and
conditions of Convention 150, and we urge your advice and consent to
ratification.

As you know, I chair the President's Committee on the ILO which includes the
Secretaries of State and Commerce, the President's National Security Advisor,
and the Presidents of the AFL-CIO and United States Council for International
Business.

The Tripartite Advisory Panel on International Labor Standards (TAPILS),
chaired by the Solicitor of Labor, is the legal subcommittee of the President's
Committee. The other members of TAPILS are the chief legal advisers of the
Departments of State and Commerce and legal counsel for the AFL-CIO and the U.S.
Council for International Business. TAPILS undertook an extensive review of
Convention 150 including a detailed examination of the precise meaning and
obligations of the Convention and consistency of U.S. law and practice with its
provisions. TAPILS found that the system of labor administration in the United
States is properly organized and coordinated and effectively operated to be in
full compliance with Convention 150. After review of this legal report, the
President's Committee unanimously agreed to recommend to the President that he
seek the Senate's advice and consent to ratification.

Chairman Moynihan, let me take this opportunity to recognize your leadership
on ILO matters. Because of your long-standing interest in the ILO, and your
singular role in seeing to it that the Senate gives renewed attention to ILO
issues; in 1988, the United States began once again to ratify ILO Conventions
after a 35 year hiatus.

I am proud to say that this Administration is firmly pledged to pursuing the
ratification of ILO Conventions, and this Committee's continuing support will be
a tremendous boost to our efforts to press for improved respect for labor
standards in the international community. The next time I appear before you to
support ratification of an ILO Convention I expect it will be on Convention 111,
a major human rights convention concerning the prohibition of discrimination in
employment.

This year marks not just the ILO's 75th year of service, but also the 50th
anniversary of the ILO's Declaration of Philadelphia, perhaps the most ambitious
attempt so far to articulate an international position on labor standards. The
ILO is the only member of the United Nations system where governments meet with
workers and employers as equal and autonomous partners. This political
structure reinforces the linkage between democracy and a free economy, between
democratic values, independent trade unions and free enterprise. Preserving
this tripartism and the integrity of the ILO's standard setting and supervisory
processes is crucial to American interests. As the Constitution of the ILO so
aptly states, "the failure of any nation to adopt humane conditions of
labor is an obstacle in the way of other nations which desire to improve the
conditions in their own countries."

American workers are aware, sometimes painfully aware, of the relevance of
those words from 1919, as they labor in today's global economy. Far more ideas,
goods and services, capital, and workers flow into and out of almost every
country than they did 50 years ago. And they do so far more rapidly. Ours is
an age of instant international communication and mobility which heightens the
importance of international consensus on worker rights.

Over the past months I have become even more aware that international
attention is focused on the role of labor standards in economic development. I
travelled with the President to Europe in June and as part of that trip chaired
the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development's discussions on its
major unemployment study. From there, I went to Geneva to address the annual
Conference of the ILO. In both of these international organizations the
relationship between labor standards and employment is very much on the agenda.
Mr. Chairman, I would like to take a few minutes to offer some views on how we
might proceed on these matters.

Fortunately, we have advanced beyond the Cold War and the conceptual
gridlock that plagued the international community for so long. Few are willing
to argue openly that labor standards are strictly internal affairs. Nor, today
are there many who would argue that standards must be identical in every nation
to those attained in the most advanced economies. As we map the middle ground,
there are, however, some fundamental standards to which every country is
expected to conform. Some labor practices simply place countries outside the
community of civilized nations. Certainly any such list would include goods
produced by forced labor, and some forms of child labor. Nor is poverty a valid
pretext for restricting freedom of association and organization or the rights of
employers and workers to bargain collectively.

Clearly, the international community cannot attempt to dictate levels of
working hours, minimum wages, benefits or health and safety standards uniformly
matching those of the United States and other industrialized countries; the view
that developing countries must grow richer in order to improve living and
working conditions, and that they must trade if they are to grow richer, has
merit. Implicit in this belief is the acknowledgement that standards should not
be static, that a country's ability to offer its citizens better working lives
rises with development, and that international expectations may properly rise as
well. It is, therefore, appropriate to expect labor standards to improve as
economies develop. Countries with rising mass living standards offer growing
markets for other countries' exports and thus all countries have an economic
stake in broadly shared prosperity abroad. Free trade is a means, not an end.
The end is rising living standards worldwide. More jobs, and better jobs.

If the world can legitimately expect rising labor standards to accompany
development, then what criteria beyond those core norms provide guidance for
where the international community should focus its attention?

Labor conditions are determined by both economic and political factors, and
it is difficult to disentangle the effects of each. But the existence of
democratic institutions multiple parties, freedom of speech and press, clean
elections does give cause for confidence that labor conditions reflect what
the country can afford, given its level of development. The less democratic the
country, the greater the grounds for suspicion or concern that labor standards
are being suppressed in order to serve narrow or misguided interests.

What response should the international community make to policies that
affront the set of standards it articulates?

First, any response ought be authorized and implemented multilaterally, in
order to increase the odds that the intervention will be effective.

Second, there should be a menu of potential responses to labor standard
abuses, varying in both the nature and severity of their effects. This range
could include technical assistance to clear the path to improvement, so-called "sunshine"
provisions in order to highlight abuses, perhaps ineligibility for international
grant and loan programs, and targeted trade measures.

Obviously, the purpose of any intervention must be to bring about change in
the offending nations. We must be pragmatic, and must not lose sight of the
fact that trade itself by opening an economy to external influences and
empowering a wider range of internal interests can be a catalyst for
progressive change.

Developing a detailed program for advancing international labor conditions
will occupy us for many years. And the Administration is very much concerned
that it work with you, Mr. Chairman, and other members of this Congress as we
proceed in this regard. Meanwhile, we should continue to give practical force
and effect to the ILO's core mission of setting and adopting international labor
standards. Convention 150 sets the framework for the development of effective
national labor policies.

We understand it to be a non-self executing treaty. As a non-self executing
treaty, Convention 150 would not, if ratified, become directly enforceable as
U.S. law in U.S. courts. The language of the Convention does not give specific
rights to individuals. Existing legislation brings the United States into full
compliance and no new legislation would be required if the Convention is
ratified.

While Convention 150 sets precise obligations, it is written so as to allow
for maximum flexibility in recognition of differing systems of government among
the ILO's member states. In the United States there is no central, unitary body
responsible for coordinating all labor activities or running the system of labor
administration. While the Department of Labor has primary responsibility, the
system includes numerous administrative and independent agencies, the
quasi-judicial bodies of the Federal Government as well as the functions of
various state and local level agencies. The Convention requires coordination of
labor administration activities among all these bodies as well as consultation,
cooperation and negotiation with employers and workers. The thorough TAPILS
review concluded that the U.S. system is appropriate to national conditions and
is properly organized and coordinated and effectively operated.

In summary, Mr. Chairman, the Administration requests the Senate's advice
and consent to ratification of ILO Convention 150 not only to demonstrate our
support for the important technical goals of this Convention, but also to
enhance our own standing and influence in the ILO that unique tripartite
international organization dedicated to protecting and raising living standards
worldwide.